Rewards Come to Cowards Too
by Lady Kasai
Summary: Kicked up to R, baby! Boy are you guys gonna be mad at me... ::hides:: Finished, with Squall's retaliation. ZellSquall!
1. Closeted Voyeurism

_ The Margin of the Paper: Been a while since I've written anything, especially that I could upload here... So I just got the game, and I couldn't wait to start churning out some shounen-ai. Tis usually how it goes. Could be very slightly out of character, but who cares... And we'll assume the average disclaimer, ne?  
  
Muy early in the game, when they're going to Galbadia, I believe. (I wrote this on vacation.)_  
  
They were in that "dream world" again.  
  
He knew it. He knew because he'd _been_ there before. Which in turn made him wonder why he wasn't there now...but whatever. He grinned mischievously, sneaking a peek at Rinoa. She was dozing a bit, herself, after he had assured her—several times—that Squall (and the others, but he knew as well as any fool just who the princess was worried about) would be just fine. Good. She was properly distracted, then.  
  
He stepped away from the tree he'd been propped against and padded over to their fearless leader. Although Squall had fallen forward, his head was still turned to the side. His breath, steady and slow, propelled a few feather-fine tufts of hair away from his face. A closer look revealed a small bulge of flesh where the SeeD leader's cheek met awkwardly with the ground.  
  
The man was truly something else, even when he couldn't possibly be trying.  
  
It made his onlooker smile.  
  
Another quick glance at everyone around him (especially Rinoa) in order to make sure he was truly unobserved, and then he leaned forward, placing a cautious hand in the middle of his leader's back. "Squall? You there man?" He shook lightly at first. Then, receiving no reply, he shook a second time with more aggression.  
  
He was met with only the slight, gentle rising and falling of the muscled back he caressed.  
  
With a brilliant, victorious grin, he placed one hand on a leather-clad shoulder; his other hand smoothed its way over a belted hip. Then, in one smooth, self-assured motion, he turned Squall Leonheart onto his back. The slumbering body didn't stir in the least.  
  
Of course, he knew that what he was doing was probably wrong on some level, but...it was too good of a chance, and it was just this once...  
  
His fingers twitched in anticipation before lacing themselves together. He wedged the makeshift cradle underneath Squall's head, lifted it into his own lap to be pillowed, and then untwined his fingers gently, taking care not to tangle them in the waterfall of chestnut that flowed around them.  
  
Beautiful...  
  
He reached around to Squall's forehead and, using both hands (just so he could feel more of the silky hair at one time), parted the tousled mane. This action revealed the swordsman's perfect skin and trademark scar, and he couldn't have resisted touching it if he tried. One lone fingertip traced the line of tissue, down between the eyes, and he found himself wanting to follow with his lips.  
  
...But that would be going a little _too_ far.  
  
Instead, he guided his hands down the soft skin of his leader's throat, feeling out twin paths all the way down the muscular chest and abs. He parted the jacket slowly and gazed upon his friend's cotton- and leather- clad body as if it were fine china or a winning lottery ticket. His own pants were beginning to feel slightly constricted from the sensation of hardened muscles and warm cotton sliding against his palms. He ran his digits down around the man's sides, groping lightly and mapping out otherwise untouchable flesh.  
  
In the back of his mind, a tiny voice tried to scold him for his next actions, but it was the same voice that had tried to tell him to go vegetarian the summer prior to, and so he blatantly ignored it again, just as he had before.  
  
Curling his fingertips under the clean white shirt's bottom hem, he slowly edged it up, dragging his scarred knuckles against the belly of the man beneath him. His mouth went dry at the feel of the terrain of his friend's body. The slight grooves and bulges formed from years of training were absolutely perfect, and once the shirt was hiked up past the ripple of a toned stomach, he stopped for a moment to simply admire.  
  
His skin was a pretty color: tanned, but not excessively so. His body leaned forward on its own accord, and he laid his forehead against the other teen's abdomen. A few deep breaths revealed that his leader smelled like leather and fresh laundry – which really wasn't that exotic or surprising, considering the obvious, but still...  
  
It was different...because it was _him_.  
  
He turned his head and let his cheek rest against his friend's belly instead, taking in the heat and the texture and just the simple niceness of it all. How many nights? How many nights had he stayed behind to watch and enjoy and yearn silently for the object of his desire? His hands strayed lower, smoothing against powerful thighs that amazed him worth perfect katas—perhaps even more perfect than his own.  
  
He chuckled and nuzzled the navel beneath his nose at the thought. Maybe he should voice that thought aloud? It would certainly be worth the bruise to his ego to see the look of utter disbelief on his best friend's face.  
  
He knew he was taking the coward's way out, but he also knew that he had a better chance of watching Shiva sunbathe than actually getting together with his idol.  
  
...And suddenly, something was off as the flesh against his face rumbled to life.  
  
"Zell?"  
  
His body tensed like a bow and he froze, expecting the worse even as he enjoyed the way the baritone purr echoed through the gut of the man beneath him. "Yeah?"  
  
"Lean back for a sec."  
  
The order was carried out immediately, albeit slowly. The tension still flowed throughout his body, making it feel as if his back would snap in two. When he was upright once more, his breath was shocked from his body when the man below him shifted and, instead of sitting up and decking him good, moved _closer_. Closer, in fact, until his back was nestled in the curve of his crossed calves, and –holy **shit**-- his head found a resting place right against the inside of his left thigh. He watched in a slight haze of disbelief as his friend shifted a few more times, adjusting limbs and clothing, and then stilled once more.  
  
It took every ounce of willpower in him to force his voice from his body. "B-better?"  
  
"Yeah."  
  
He ran his fingers through Squall's hair, receiving a very small, very _rare_ smile for it.  
  
And after that, nothing else mattered. 


	2. Squall Retaliates

_Part Two I guess, though it could stand alone? Inspiration from the reviews, in which I was asked for Squall's retaliation twice over. It came to me while on vacation, and is actually a really old fic idea I wanted to put on paper anyway. So I guess this for you guys (I'm hoping you know who you are... lol).. Turned up the heat a little, 'n'at._

_Hope you like! Squall may be a teeny bit OOC, but it worked, and was sexy, so this is me caring._

A growl and the hard, blunt thudding sounds of bare-fisted boxing permeated the room. The punching bag hung from the ceiling quivered violently at every assault, swaying back and forth through the humid air. Its opponent had been attacking it relentlessly for three continuous hours, and was tiring quite a bit. Golden locks stuck to his forehead, secured there by the natural glue of human sweat. It rolled in small droplets down the tight pectorals and chiseled abs of the teen, and came to darken the fabric of his boxers as it was absorbed.

It was the time in between dusk and night, where the sky is mostly black but few stars have shown their faces. The day had been long and trying, with the search for the commander endlessly proving fruitless. However, none of this particularly bothered the blonde. Sure, he was impatient and angry that his hometown had been infiltrated, but at least it gave him the chance to come home. He'd been worried about his mother. No, what bothered him was his own commander's attitude.

Bouncing on the balls of his feet, he reared back and thrust his fist into the abused equipment once more, channeling his frustration into a means of training. Squall had been even more aloof than usual lately, which, in Zell's opinion, had to be quite the accomplishment. It didn't really shock him, because he had previously assumed from the way Squall was always tense while they were in Balamb, that something had happened in the family that was pretty important... But why did he just have to be such a complete ass about it?

"Son of a bitch..." he muttered to himself and hit the bag again. "Goddamned introverted jerk!" He began a rhythmic sort of pattern. He was becoming angrier, simply because he saw no reason to calm himself down, hence his rare use of vulgar language. "Bastard can't even pull his head out of his own ass long enough to give a shit about anyone else's problems... Don't even know how the hell he nailed commander; prick must've given some pretty amazing head to Cid." It was here that he paused in his efforts at the sheer disgust that flowed through him. He shivered at the thought, and then began again. A solid, vicious punch emphasized each word, causing the bag he was hitting to groan threateningly. "Domineering, arrogant, sadistic, suicidal, introverted, apathetic, bastardly, depressing, antagonistic, moody, Seifer-wannabe! Why—the _hell_—do you have to be so—"

He slumped, finally, in exhaustion. His knees buckled beneath him and hit the floor, and his upper body simply leaned against the beaten piece of equipment.

"Seifer-wannabe, huh? Don't you think that one was a little harsh?"

Zell's eyelids snapped open and his body whirled onto his feet. His eyes widened considerably at the sight of Squall standing at his door, wearing nothing but his white t-shirt and a pair of faded black jeans. "You!"

"You were pretty accurate on everything else, however, if I do say so myself."

"Why the hell are you in my house? How long have you been here?'

"Your mother let me in, and about ten minutes."

The realization set in that Squall probably had probably seen his entire episode just then. It hurt his ego, and this in turn spiked his anger even further. He didn't bother with words, and instead simply took three large steps towards his commander and swung. Having started the martial arts when he was four years old, it was never a huge concern to him as to whether he'd be good enough to fight his opponent...he'd always simply assumed that he was the more superior fighter.

He soon discovered that Squall wasn't commander for nothing, however, and a few seconds of pain and a very loud grunt later, Zell found his arms bound at his back, which was now facing Squall. Not willing to be done in so easily, he continued to struggle. He tossed his body from right to left, he leaned forward, and tried to kick back in between Squall's legs, but his energy was spent in vain, as the only thing he accomplished in the long run was a light sheen on Squall's forehead, and the tousling of his already-messy hair.

It did, however, minutely console him that he _did _make the almighty Squall Leonheart break a sweat.

Zell swore long and violent, but did eventually give up. Expecting to be blown off and chided for his passionate behavior, as that seemed to be the only response he received from Squall in the past few days, he slumped and allowed his head to flop forward in a sign of resignation.

His unspoken prediction proved wrong, though, as his entire body was promptly heaved (quite hard, he noticed) onto his bed. His face landed directly onto his pillow, and he had only seconds to be impressed before a warm, heavy weight settled on his tailbone. He turned his head to the left, enabling him to breathe, and caught two hands going for the back of his head. His instincts began to kick in and adrenaline positively flooded his veins...and then all he could manage was a boneless lean into the mattress.

God, how he loved head scratches.

But...wait...what? Through the foggy pleasure at his scalp, Zell's brain managed to realize a few things about the situation: Squall, in his room, on top of him, giving him a head scratch, after he had just completely insulted him and went so far as to attack him. It was then that he found words to summarize this, and decided that they had to be spoken. Or, rather, mumbled into his pillow, but just the same..."_What the hell?_"

Squall didn't pause in his assault on Zell's body, but simply moved lower to knead at the tense muscles in the teen's neck. Just when the blonde didn't think he'd answer (and didn't really care at the moment), the brunette took a deep breath. "I was thinking about that time we were on our way to Galbadia."

That caused Zell to tense back up from the memory, which was immediately relieved with a long, firm stroke down the very center of his spine to the elastic of his boxers, then back up to the sensitive spot between his shoulder blades. It brought a violent shiver throughout his body (he was ticklish, after all, and on top of that, slightly aroused from the feel of Squall's steady hands working his body). "Mmhmm...?"

There was a slight shift in weight, as if Squall had shrugged or itched his nose, and then, "It was something else to wake up to you, with my head pillowed on your legs. I could feel the heat of your body through your shorts, against my cheek..."

Zell suddenly wished he was wearing those very shorts, but couldn't quite form a complete sentence, as Squall's fingertips were now digging into and massaging the corded muscles of his sides and lower back.

"It was so good to lay there and take in the way you smelled... How smooth the skin of your hands felt when you pressed them over my body..."

Zell was now restraining himself from grinding against the bed. He wasn't quite fully aroused, not yet, but the deep purr that was pouring from his leader's lips coupled with the fact that his fingers were now dipping below his boxers (God help him) was beginning to get him more hot and bothered by the second. "Mmnn?"

And then the world began to spin, because Squall, with all the smoothness and grace in the world, took a hold of his boxers and slipped them from his body in one single movement. Even more maddeningly so, he continued on in his explanation as if Zell were clothed in a parka and bunker pants. "You wouldn't leave me alone, Zell. I'd wake up sometimes, raging hard, from dreams where I got to feel that heat against my whole body. You wouldn't fucking leave me alone, and there was nothing I could do about it. Because you were there _every day..._"

Zell couldn't decide if he was more horny or lethargic.

"And every time we'd touch, it was agony..."

There were times, of course, when they did touch. Quite a few. It was only natural, since they were fighting so constantly. They had each carried each other around before, nursed each others' injuries, bathed, and clothed each other... He knew Squall's body like he knew his own, but it wasn't particularly intimate. It didn't feel like it, anyway. But... was he getting at the same thing?

"So I decided that since you _obviously _weren't going to do much about what you started, I was going to have to finish this. Hope you don't mind." With that, he went back to work, kneading and feeling, grabbing and groping wherever he felt he wanted to, yet still keeping it innocent enough to make it look like a massage.

It was driving Zell absolutely _insane_.

Once the SeeD commander finished with his butt, thighs, calves and feet, he got up momentarily. The blonde on the bed, now hopelessly focused on A, his arousal, and B, the lack of warmth at his back, keened in distress at the loss, but was soon quieted as a now-very-_nude_ Squall Leonheart smoothed his body against his friend's from the bottom up.

The feeling of their flesh gliding together was electric, but it was nothing compared to Squall's next actions.

A tongue teased the outer edge of his ear ever-so-lightly while hot, moist breath blew over it in a rhythmic pattern. And then that voice, that goddamned sexy voice of his, whispered itself straight into his other head. "And if you _do _mind, Zell Dincht, well... I guess I'm just going to have to convince you otherwise, aren't I?"

Zell lost his composure, then, and flipped his body over (rather awkwardly, as not only was his body virtually unresponsive with his bones the consistency of jello, but Squall wasn't exactly weightless, either) and captured the stoic brunette's mouth. Their groins ground against each other roughly as the two teens attacked each other in a wave of passion, the heat from their bodies causing rivulets of sweat to dance in the grooves of—

"Zell? Zell honey, I brought up finger sandwiches for you and your friend..."

Squall froze immediately, followed by Zell, and the two could only watch forebodingly as the door creaked open slowly. The blonde's mother stood in the door jam holding a tray of small, triangular sandwiches in front of her, which threatened to topple to the floor in her complete and total shock. "...Zell?"

"Uh... Hey, Ma! Heh, look..."

* * *

_And you can blame for that one! Bastards violating our freedom of expression... Wasn't quite pleased with how this one turned out (probably because of the lack of yaoi goodness ), but if you ask me nicely enough, perhaps I'll finish this sucker properly and dish it out...   
_


End file.
